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Flyers Ground Bruins, 4-1

In front of 19,550 orange, black and white jersey wearing Broad Street Bullies fans, the Boston Bruins lost their third straight game, this time to the pesky Philadelphia Flyers, 4-1, Saturday afternoon in Philadelphia's Wachovia Center.

Just 1:16 into the third period, Philly forward Mike Richards took advantage of a defensive miscue and put a pair of shots on Boston goalie Joey MacDonald.

MacDonald miraculously stoned the wide open Richards on the first shot, but was beaten when the rebound found the Flyer's stick and he tucked the game-winning puck past the prone B's keeper and made the score 2-1.

"It was a bad break on their second goal," said Boston head coach Dave Lewis. "We had some chances, but (the puck) is not going in for us, right now.

"We've got to capitalize. One of our strengths all season long was our power play (which went 0-5 today). We need it most now, and it disappointed us."

Versus Minnesota on Thursday, the Bruins went down 1-0 early when a 60-foot slapshot beat Tim Thomas over the left shoulder. Unfortunately for the Black & Gold faithful watching in New England on NESN, the B's game on Saturday started with an eerily similar goal against a helpless Boston netminder.

Simon Gagne grabbed a puck out from around 50-feet out and sent a guided missile (and his 37th goal) past MacDonald at 1:58 of the opening period. But contrary to last game, the Black & Gold came back quickly. Later in the period, first year defenseman Bobby Allen made a smart play to keep a puck alive in the Philadelphia end. He shot the puck from the point into the opposite corner of the Flyers zone and it ended up on an open Marc Savard's stick.

Savard feathered a pass to Dennis Wideman who then launched his own rocket past Philly's Martin Biron at 7:30.

Both goalies kept their opponents off the board in the second period and the game's pace slowed into yet another defensive struggle. But it was the Flyers who held the momentum for most of the middle stanza and they were able muster a dozen shots on Boston's net.

Philadelphia turned that momentum into offense early in the final third of regulation as a Bruins defender was unable to clear the Boston end and gave Richards the opportunity to put the Flyers ahead 2-1.

The rest of the game was the Flyers as shorthanded, Philadelphia's Scottie Upshall skated out of the Bruins end and scored his seventh goal of the season at 13:17 to make the scoreboard read 3-1.

Finally, Dmitry Afanasenkov scored his 10th goal into an open net to make the score 4-1.

"It's not the way we all wanted (the trip to start) or how we planned it out to be," said B's veteran center, Mark Mowers. "Things don't look good, but we have to stay positive and keep going forward."